Experimenting with household/garden stuff …… and fibre!
I think I might have had too much time on my hands a while ago. As we say here ‘What’s seldom is wonderful!’ So I got a little curious about some things. Fibre of course had to be involved.
We don’t drink coffee in our house – my husband was never a fan and I found myself to be allergic to it after going cold turkey in China back in the 80s. I do love the coffee aroma and I can be sometimes found near one of our oldest coffee houses in Dublin, Bewleys, just sniffing the air. At this point, I really have to post a link to their rather famous cafe in the heart of Dublin. It’s a haunt of mine, even though I can’t drink it. It is worth calling in to if you are on vacation (the food is amazing). There can be queues so it is worth going early. Besides the food, the original works of art are breath taking. https://bewleysgraftonstreet.com/
What has this got to do with my post – absolutely nothing – but I just had to share so you have a special spot to add to your itinerary when you visit Dublin, Ireland.
But, I digress. We drink a lot of tea in the house and while I like lots of different flavours, I tend to consume mostly an Irish brand, Barrys. It, along with an Irish brand of crisps (potato chips) called Tayto are two products most requested when visiting ex-pats. We use tea bags rather than leaf tea and we compost the remainder as the bags are now biodegradable.
My first thought during this time of being busy doing nothing was, would the tea bags (without the tea) felt into merino fibre. Before I could experiment I had to empty the tea bags and wash and dry them. I have to admit this was not a favourite job. The smell of the used bags assaulted my nostrils, so I worked quickly (every cloud, silver lining and all that!). Once dry I divided the bags into two groups and I made marks on one group with what I thought was alcohol based walnut ink and let it dry. Then I went to work laying down the ‘marked’ tea bags and adding 10g of merino fibre on top (4 layers) I finished off with the unmarked tea bags, layering them so that I could see how thick it could make them before the fibre would stop permeating them.
It was a successful experiment. The bags fully felted into the fibre and the sample shrank by 45%. The marks, however disappeared, so I will add them again. It turns out the ink was acrylic – note to self: next time, read the label before buying!
I do like the textural finish on this piece and it is good to see that something as mundane and ordinary as a used tea bag can yield a successful result. Here’s a very quick peak at the bags and outcome:
Recently, I’ve been doing a bit of reading up on the science behind making felt. What we usually do is add soap to water, in my own case, I use olive oil soap which has a pH of 8. The paper I read maintained that wool fibre would felt once the pH value was moved from neutral. This meant that I should be able to felt a sample by adding an acid solution to the fibre. I was keen to try it to see what would happen.
First of all, I rinsed off all my equipment, my water bowl, ball brause, bubble wrap and fulling cloth to make sure there was no soapy residue around. Then I laid out my sample (4 layers). I checked the pH of the water, which was neutral. I then added a quarter cup of vinegar to my water and checked the pH value which was now 4. The water was tepid. I wet out the sample. The first thing I noticed was that the water did not soak into the fibre as it usually does when soap is added and it took a lot more water and pushing on the fibres to encourage them to soak up the water. When I turned the sample over, there were still dry patches so even more water was needed! That (plus the smell) were the only differences I noticed. It felted easily and shrank down 47%. When it came to fulling the sample, I heated up the water/vinegar solution in the microwave. One advantage of using the acid solution is that the ‘water’ could be used for the next project. That said, I reckon it could be very hard on the hands if this was my main way of making felt. So I am going to decant it into a spray bottle and use it to clean windows, no waste!
We have a beautiful Norweigan Spruce tree growing in our front garden. I like to refer to it as the gift that keeps on giving because it constantly suprises us. For example, last year, while I was mindlessly staring into the garden, it launched a pollen bomb. For those of us (this included myself up to this point) unfamiliar with the term, the tree released it pollen all in one go. So the whole tree was suddenly surrounded by a yellow haze. In an instant, the haze lifted into the sky and was carried off in the wind. It was truly spectacular. I have lots of allergies and pollen would be one of my nemesis but I would put up with the discomfort to see this again. Here’s a short Youtube video on the topic. Our tree did it on its own while this one was shook but you will get the picture https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rh2Da8Ms45M
Anyway, back to my story. I found I had lots of fallen pine cones at the base of the tree so I gathered only some of them and put them on to boil in my dyepot. The house was filled with a gorgeous pine scent during this process. Once I had extracted the dye from the cones, I filtered the mix through some muslin to remove the resin. The colour was absolutely stunning – a jewel red. I used it for four experiments; first of all, I extracted a litre of the liquid to make a pigment, then I used the remainder of the dyebath to dye some fibres (unfortunately I do not have a photo of the results and they are now added to my mountain of experiments (unlabelled – what was I thinking!). Experiment number three involved adding some of the leftover dye bath to citric acid to make a pigment. In the last experiment I left the liquid alone and just added the alum and soda crystals to separate the dye from the liquid base. Once separated, I filtered the liquid out of the pigment, then dried and ground all the results. So, I ended up with three different pigments and some dyed fibre experiments. I have inclluded a photo of the pigment made last summer and the result of the latest experiment in winter. There is quite a difference in the colour as you will see from the slide slow:
Gathered pine cones in the dye pot 
Filtering the resin during dye extraction 
Glorious colour from the cones! 
Catching the dye colour in the sunshine! 
Making pigment 
I threw a variety of fibres into the dyepot 
Cone pigment before it dries 
Not sure which experiment with pine cones this photo related to 
The filtering process with the pine cones 
pigment comparison on pine cones: summer one is to the right winter to the left – same tree, different result 
Pine cone – liquid extracted before using the dyebath. 
leftover dye bath from the pine cones with citric acid added 
pine cone pigment from leftover dye bath
There’s a back story to the last project. We have a number of fruit trees in our garden. Unfortunately we lost one of our plum trees last year. This was despite our eldest son’s (naturally green fingered which he inherited from paternal grandmother having skipped a generation) efforts to save it. Finally, there was no other option but to fell it. He also decided to remove the roots which was a big job as the tree had been there a number of years. It became the focus for my last household and garden project. I wanted to find out if the dye from plum tree bark differs from the dye from plum tree root. To find out, I decided to peel some of the bark off one of the branches. I did the same with the outer cover of the root. I soaked these in different containers for up to a week. Now, here’s what I found interesting. Whereas I needed to heat the pine cone liquid to extract the dye in my previous project, this was not needed for the bark/root projects; the dye naturally extracted sitting in its vessel and the high tannin level meant that all I needed to do was soak my fibres and fabric. It was like magic! I wanted to use the dye in some small vessels I made for the 10g challenge I spoke about in my last post. Then, I took what remained in the dye pot and made pigment from it. I found it interesting that the result from the plum bark dye yielded a lighter colour dye but a richer pigment – the root was the opposite. The fabric/fibre experiment produced is a lovely rich golden hue on the different surfaces. Also, it turned out to be another gift that kept on giving as each time I used up all the dye, I added more water to the two mixes and it kept extracting dye – I could not even notice if the dye was weaker in the second round than it was in the first. In the end I composted the bark and roots as I needed to move on with life (I got busy again!)
Here’s a quick run through in photos:
Paring back the plum bark 
Paring the plum root 
time to play with dyeing fibre plum root 
Trying Shibori – not particularly satisfactory when opened up 
sample of all the different fibres I played with – plum root 
Dye -v- pigment comparison plum bark 
dye -v- pigment comparison plum root 
Plum root final colour when rinsed and dried – Yum!
Do you use household or garden items in your textile practice? Have they ever surprised you? I would love to hear about your experiences.
Helene x
1.1) the end of the path heading to the farm
1.2) apples and grape vines with tiny buds of grapes
2.1) some of the animals on the farm
2.2) The guests of honor, one of whom thought my walker wheel a tasty snack!
3.1) shearing in front of an audience.
4.1) Demoing spinning and felting
4.2) touch samples of various fibers
4.3) the sample table
4.4) Inkle weaving and electric spinning wheel (with portable battery power source)
5.1) sheep may be having an Instagram moment after a strange seep trys to sneak into the herd
5.2) small girl in yellow dress gives hands full of grass to sheep wating at fence
5.3) The lambs having a nap after the sheerer relieve there moms of all there fleece
5.4) Alpaca
5.5) some form of snow ball bush I think, it was very pretty and there were variations near the farm
5.6) it was a very pretty walk but it felt like it was much longer on the way back.
5.7) Ann at the Farmers market
7.1) Alpaca seller
7.2) Pottery vendor
7.3) Sassy by Nicci had figures made of resin. I like these little guys
7.4) this woodworker had bird houses, as well as these bat and bee houses
7.5) This one had some weaving
7.6) horns and horn cups. They are finished so you can drink hot or cold drinks or pop in them.
7.7) There even was a vendor selling blacksmith made stuff. Do you see the woven centure fleshay belt?
8.1) smithing a gun barrel
9.1-9.2) the blacksmithing class
9.3) inspecting samples of scissors looking at the handle loops
9.4) The instructor traced a sample scissor handle on his anvil so he had a pattern to work from
9.5) Glenn trying out his new camera
9.6) some of the sample scissors and scissor parts
9.7) this is one of the students, we saw her last year. She had an ingenious way of working when she ran out of hands.
9.8) a guillotine tool in the hardy hole
10.1) the field behind the museum
11.1) lovely fire in the forge. just remember not to breath the green smoke!!
11.1) “Are you doing voodoo?”
11.2) posterior delts and lats building up.
12.1) block stacking game without words?
12.2) Monster mash
12.3) a game with Lego mecks
13.1) One of the other vendors was a bindery which had handmade books and bound fanzines
14.1) on to the fish-y parts!
14.2) adding the Pelvic fins
14.3)Adding wool to the fish part and adding Fins at the hip(Pectoral fins), more lower fins(Pelvic and anal fins), Dorsal fins and a cool tail (Caudal fin).
14.4) building up the fiber and consulting some of the reference photos
14.5) This was my notes from reviewing Sara’s videos, I modified this a bit from her original. You can extend the body length with extra wire if your fish is longer than the average Mer-person.
15.1) preparing to self-felt!
15.2) considering where to poke first
6.1) The Rook wheel and some pretty roving were added to yesterday’s felting stuff.
6.2) A quick peek as the games are still coming in this morning to the sale and are being put out on the tables. By 10 am, the time the sale starts, games more than fill every table!
6.3) The line goes across the curling rink and then proceeds along the far wall
6.4) “Agricola” is a 2 Person game about raising sheep. (We have not tried it yet, but the sheep are wooden and look very cute!)
6.5 Some of the Games I found, including what he had requested!
7.1) stabbed in the back by a felting needle, but he has a bit more latts!
7.2) Lounging on the bag of world of wool core carded roving
7.3) Ooh, I have reached the glutes and the first fins!! Oh, the possibilities, they have to be good glutes, to attract Miss Teen Mer back to the office when I get home!
7.4) cleaned off the little bit of yarn on the bobbin, ready for spinning.
8.1 The open gaming section filled up after the game sale had slowed down and remained full all day.
8.2) I added sewing pins to give me eye locations while I work. It’s getting very busy with games now.
9.1) Not a clue what is happening, but they seemed very focused and having fun.
9.2) This is a racing game that was being played on the table beside me. Like many of the games I was seeing, it has lovely graphics. Even if watching cars drive in a mostly circular track isn’t really your thing, it’s still really pretty to look at.
9.3) Definitely impending carnage!
9.4) Some of the war games with figures had very interesting architecture or terrains
9.5) This one had a part of a town, I don’t remember what kind of army was fighting through it. It was possibly more normal than guys in space suits from the other table.
10.1) This game is for 12 little magnetic robots. You can see the little robots on the nearby table, all sides of the cube is where they will be racing.
10.2) A robot racing game on a cube
10.3) A good strategy seemed to be to take a picture of the part of the board your robot was on, then select your cards from your photo(then hope for the best).
10.4) As you can see, the robots are dispersing on two sides now
10.5) They are working through the second card of this round. They are having lots of fun, and it’s been fun to watch.
10.6) You can see the layers, so those must be a sedimentary plastic rock, maybe sandstone? Such fine detail in the 3-D plastic!
10.7) These little skeletons were so cool, but where would I put them? I did enjoy looking at them over the weekend, and they were quite photogenic for skeletons.
